Author: Scott

Classic Post From The Old Card Site: Put Up Your Dukes, Parts I and II!

2020 Notes: this is the one of the first real features I did on my old site, and also a story about the first boxing card I got. On the same day that I got it, and saw the scrapbook that it came from, which is featured below, another gentleman came into my old local, where it came from, with another card album, this one holding the first 1951 Topps Ringsides I’d seen in person, including the Rocky Marciano card. I was hooked as soon as I saw those, and the rest is history. It was cool looking back at this post, and seeing how far things have come since then. Enjoy this look back at the scrapbook, the card I got from it, and the 2010-era Hobby Shop card display cases.

Image description: a 1948 Leaf Boxing John L. Sullivan trading card, in a plastic holder with gold screws. Boxer John L. Sullivan, a shirtless white man wearing blue pants with a white belt, assumes a boxing stance against a red background with a white border. Below him, "JOHN L. SULLIVAN" is printed in white letters on a black background.
Image description: a 1948 Leaf Boxing John L. Sullivan trading card, in a plastic holder with gold screws. Boxer John L. Sullivan, a shirtless white man wearing blue pants with a white belt, assumes a boxing stance against a red background with a white border. Below him, “JOHN L. SULLIVAN” is printed in white letters on a black background.

Put up your dukes! John L. sure did!

I got this card last night, a steal at any price, much less $15, even with the glue damage on the back:

Image description: the back of a 1948 Leaf Boxing John L. Sullivan trading card. Some paper is stuck to the card, as it was glued into an album and removed from it. Text on back of card is transcribed in image caption.
Image description: the back of a 1948 Leaf Boxing John L. Sullivan trading card. Some paper is stuck to the card, as it was glued into an album and removed from it. Text, in black letters on grey background, is as follows: “101—JOHN L. SULLIVAN 1st Heavyweight Champ 1882-1892 Won-32 Lost-1 Best Wgt. 195 lbs. Born-Boston Height-5’10” 1/2 Most “experts” list the first battle for the heavyweight championship of the world under Marquis of Queensbury rules with gloves and 3 minute rounds between Sullivan and James J. Corbett Sept. 7, 1892 in New Orleans. Corbett won by KO in 21 rds. However, Sullivan previously had been acclaimed as “first” champion by virtue of bare knuckle win over Paddy Ryan in 1882. Earned only $125,000 in ring, but more than a million dollars on theatrical and lecture tours. KNOCK-OUT BUBBLE GUM Collect this series of Boxing Greats You’ll be proud to show your gorgeous collection of Knock-Out cards in beautiful, specially designed 32 pg. Album. Get it for only 5 Knock-Out Wrappers and 25c. Striking color cover. Large (11 1/2″ x 8 1/2″) heavy black pages. Can display 168 Knock-Out cards. Send wrappers and coin to: LEAF GUM CO., BOX 5997 CHICAGO 80, ILL. Copyright 1948″

You see, there’s a great story behind that glue damage. This card was part of a pretty amazing collection that walked into my local card shop a few weeks ago. A man of about 70 brought in a leather-bound scrapbook he’d put together when he was about 9 or 10. In it, he had pasted newspaper clippings of some sports stories of the time, and further into the book, he’d also pasted a collection of probably about 100 sports cards (baseball, football and boxing), from the ’48 and ’49 Leaf sets and the ’49 Bowman set. We’re not talking lightweights here, either, as Ruth, DiMaggio and Teddy Ballgame were all represented on the baseball end of things, Doak Walker was in the football collection, and among the boxers, Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson and the great John L. Sullivan (a criminally undervalued card even for its relatively late vintage, considering that “The Boston Strong Boy” was essentially the first American superstar athlete), pictured above, were just a few of the many names I saw.

The cards, aside from the paste jobs on the backs (which, all things considered, weren’t the worst I’ve seen by a long shot) were all pretty well-preserved and meticulously organized (including stencilled team names at the tops of the pages; the stencil was still in the scrapbook, too), especially considering that a kid of 10 or so, in the late ’40s did this. It’s actually a damn shame that the scrapbook was sold and disassembled after all this time, as it was a gorgeous time capsule and had to be full of memories for the owner, but from a business perspective, the collection would’ve been near-impossible to sell except by auction, which could’ve been dicey and a world of hassle.

Thanks to Bob at The Hobby Shop, I was able to take some pictures of the scrapbook, as well as some pictures of the other cards that were in it along with my John L. Sullivan card. Stand by for awesomeness.

Image description: an old, worn brown leather scrapbook, center, sits on top of a glass display case filled with trading cards.
Image description: an old, worn brown leather scrapbook, center, sits on top of a glass display case filled with trading cards.

The cover of this leatherbound beauty!

Image description: interior of a scrapbook shows, at left, a blank beige page, and at right, a brown stencil, about standard 8 1/2" by 11" binder size. Stencil contains the alphabet, numbers 1 through 9, and a about a dozen symbols.
Image description: interior of a scrapbook shows, at left, a blank beige page, and at right, a brown stencil, about standard 8 1/2″ by 11″ binder size. Stencil contains the alphabet, numbers 1 through 9, and a about a dozen symbols.

The stencil used to letter the pages.

Image description: 2 newspaper clippings containing black and white photos from reports on old college American football games are glued onto a ruled page of binder paper in a scrapbook. In the pictures from the clippings, white men play American football. In the top clipping, a scrum of football players appears. In the bottom clipping, a white man wearing a number 16 jersey runs with a fooball while two other white men stand nearby, one wearing a dark jersey, possibly with a number 38 on it. There is text above the photos in the clippings, but it is not entirely legible in the picture.
Image description: 2 newspaper clippings containing black and white photos from reports on old college American football games are glued onto a ruled page of binder paper in a scrapbook. In the pictures from the clippings, white men play American football. In the top clipping, a scrum of football players appears. In the bottom clipping, a white man wearing a number 16 jersey runs with a fooball while two other white men stand nearby, one wearing a dark jersey, possibly with a number 38 on it. There is text above the photos in the clippings, but it is not entirely legible in the picture.
Image description: 2 newspaper clippings containing black and white photos from reports on old college American football games are glued onto a ruled page of binder paper in a scrapbook. In the pictures from the clippings, white men play American football. In the top clipping, 4 football players are visible, and at the center, one of them is grabbing number 26 from behind as numbers 60, left, and 86, right, look on. In the bottom clipping, a white man wearing a number 41 jersey runs with a fooball, left, while a scrum of 3 other men struggle with each other to the right of the phot. There is text above the photos in the clippings, but it is not entirely legible in the picture.
Image description: 2 newspaper clippings containing black and white photos from reports on old college American football games are glued onto a ruled page of binder paper in a scrapbook. In the pictures from the clippings, white men play American football. In the top clipping, 4 football players are visible, and at the center, one of them is grabbing number 26 from behind as numbers 60, left, and 86, right, look on. In the bottom clipping, a white man wearing a number 41 jersey runs with a fooball, left, while a scrum of 3 other men struggle with each other to the right of the phot. There is text above the photos in the clippings, but it is not entirely legible in the picture.

A few pages of college football clippings!

Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper, in a scrapbook, with "PRO FOOTBALL" stencilled onto it in black ink. "PRO" is written horizontally at top center, and "FOOTBALL" is written diagonally, left to right, across the center of the page.
Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper, in a scrapbook, with “PRO FOOTBALL” stencilled onto it in black ink. “PRO” is written horizontally at top center, and “FOOTBALL” is written diagonally, left to right, across the center of the page.

The front page of the pro f00’ball section.

Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper, in a scrapbook, with "SENATOR" stencilled across the center of the page in blue ink.
Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper, in a scrapbook, with “SENATOR” stencilled across the center of the page in blue ink.

From the baseball section, a young man runs out of room to stencil in “Senators”.

Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper in a scrapbook, with square brown stains on the page, from where sports trading cards were once glued to it.
Image description: a ruled piece of binder paper in a scrapbook, with square brown stains on the page, from where sports trading cards were once glued to it.

The back page of the Red Sox section. If you look closely, you can see where the cards were.

Image description: baseball cards featuring white and black baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: baseball cards featuring white and black baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case. From top to bottom, top row: 1956 Topps Al Kaline, 1956 Topps Karl Spooner, 1956 Topps Roberto Clemente, 1955 Topps Jackie Robinson. Second Row: 1954 Bowman Willie Mays, 1949 Leaf Ted Williams, 1954 Topps Ted Williams, 1954 Topps Hank Aaron. Third row: 1973 Topps Hank Aaron, 1965 Topps Steve Carlton, unknown 1954 Bowman card, 1970 Topps Ernie Banks, unknown New York Yankees player on 1956 Topps card. Fourth row, at bottom: 1973 Topps Nolan Ryan, 1974 Topps Nolan Ryan, 1970 Topps Nolan Ryan, 1955 Topps Sandy Amoros, 1954 Topps Tommy Lasorda.
Image description: baseball cards featuring white baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: baseball cards featuring white baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case. Top row: 1957 Topps Mickey Mantle, 1949 Leaf Lou Brissie. Bottom row, from left to right: 1968 Topps Mickey Mantle, 1949 Leaf Babe Ruth, 1949 Leaf Elmer Valo.

 

Image description: approximately 26 baseball and basketball cards featuring white and black baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: approximately 26 baseball and basketball cards featuring white and black baseball players in plastic holders fill a display case, too many to name all of, but 1968 Topps Roberto Clemente, 1949 Bowman Yogi Berra, 1949 Leaf Phil Rizzuto, 1949 Leaf Dom DiMaggio, and a stack of “Assorted Iverson” are in top row from left to right. 1957 Topps Frank Robinson, 1954 Bowman Yogi Berra, 1949 Leaf Joe DiMaggio, 1949 Bowman Bobby Doerr and an Upper Deck Dirk Nowitzki are in second row from left to right. Third row has 1970 Topps Johnny Bench, 1966 Topps Pete Rose, and 1949 Bowman Bobby Doerr from left to right. Fourth and bottom row has 1968 Topps Johnny Bench, 1954 Topps Whitey Ford, and 1964 Topps Pete Rose from left to right.
Image description: trading cards featuring white football players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: trading cards featuring white football players in plastic holders fill a display case. Visible are 1949 Leaf cards of Johnny Lujack, Doak Walker, Sid Luckman, Bobbie “Blonde Bomber” Layne, Bob Waterfield, and a 1965 Topps Joe Namath card.
Image description: trading cards featuring white football players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: trading cards featuring white football players in plastic holders fill a display case. Visible are 1949 Leaf cards of Chuck Bednarik, George McAfee, Sammy Baugh, and two cards of Don Maynard.
Image description: trading cards featuring white and black boxers and football players in plastic holders fill a display case.
Image description: trading cards featuring white and black boxers and football players in plastic holders fill a display case. Visible are 1949 Leaf football cards of Bob Waterfield and Harry “Chick” Jagade, and 1948 Leaf boxing cards of Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, Jake La Motta and Max Schmeling.

Classic Post from The Old Card Site: Getting on the ass end of a pretty long bandwagon, by my own admission…

…but here I am.

I’m Scott. Some of you may know me from…well, all over. I could talk about those other places and other things that I’ve done or how we may know each other, but that’s not what we’re here for, and hell, you all know how to use search engines if you get curious, right? (For those of you who don’t know me from elsewhere and are finding me for the first time, be warned, those search results get kinda weird and kinda not-safe-for-work-or-kids.)

So, yeah, enough about me and what I did on some date with some stuff with some dudes.

I’m here today, and ideally for the forseeable future, to talk with you about trading cards.

I love trading cards.

I’m pretty sure I bought my first pack at some point during 1980. It was a pack of 1980 Topps baseball cards, bought at a old, run down grocery store owned by a man named George. I could be wrong about this, but I think my Rickey Henderson rookie card came from my first pack. I seem to remember Dwight Evans and Tom Burgmeier being in there too, though again, it was decades ago and very hazy.

Since that day, I’ve had an on-again, off-again, love/hate/love relationship with trading cards of all varieties. I mainly collect baseball cards, but I’ve collected a whole mess of other types of trading cards. Football, basketball, hockey, “Howard The Duck”…let me tell you, people, it gets ugly around here sometimes.

After 30 years of collecting cards, I’m still not exactly sure what draws me to them quite so strongly, causes me to spend a ton of hours sorting through them, makes me spend money I don’t really have on them, or has compelled me to create a place to talk about them with other folks. It could be that I’m a culture junkie. It could be the connection to my own youth that they have. It could be about a wider connection to history that comes from an unlikely source. It could even be an appreciation for what’s, in all truth, an incredible form of pop art. Yes, even in the case of the “Howard The Duck” cards. Oh, who am I kidding? ESPECIALLY in the case of the “Howard The Duck” cards.

Whatever the reason, I’ve been thinking about opening shop and talking with you all about cards for what seems like forever now, but tonight’s the night I finally chose to do it. Maybe it’s because I spent a fair chunk of my evening at a store, hands-deep in 1980 Topps cards. No Rickey this time, but I did replace my Tom Burgmeier card and while I don’t want to say I replaced my Dwight Evans, because a card that’s been with me quite as long as that, you don’t replace, but I did get another copy of it in better condition than the slept on, eaten on, thrown around, with me through several moves and most of my life one that may or may not have been in my first pack.

As for what I’ll specialize in here, among a pretty crowded and still-growing field: mostly, it’ll be sharing.

I’ve got some cool cards that I’d like to show folks, and if people want to talk about or show off theirs here, that’s cool as well. I’ve also got a bunch of doubles, so in an effort to get them out into the world, I’ll be trading them to interested parties, giving some away, and occasionally selling them, though like most of the card collectors I know of who aren’t dealers, what I have doesn’t have a ton of monetary value. In the meantime, if you have want lists, feel free to send them here. I’ll be posting mine as soon as I write something up that provides some context to it.

This won’t be a news site per se, but if I come across news that’s beneficial or interesting to us and not splattered everywhere, I’ll pass it on.

Instead of up-to-the-minute reports on sell sheets and the like (which are done very well elsewhere), I’ll be more likely to talk about what I’ve seen, thought and have experienced during my time as a card collector, or during my time as a person who happens to collect cards, and see what you folks think about it. Hopefully, it turns into a fun discussion.

If this opening piece has struck you as a bit sedate for the launch of a site, it’s by design. My first instinct when I write things like this is to jump around and yell and throw stuff and curse and break things, but I paused for a minute and went in a different direction when I resumed writing. (This isn’t to say that the wild rumpus won’t happen here occasionally, because it will.)

I did this because decided that the Crazy Eddie approach to talking about cards ran counter to how I feel when I spend time going through cards and looking at them.

When I look through trading cards, I feel calm. Again, for reasons I’m not entirely aware of, it quiets me. I’m really thankful for that. I forgot to mention that in my list of reasons for collecting cards, didn’t I?

Here’s hoping that you all get a great feeling of some sort when you look through cards, and that you’ll come by here to talk about them with my readers and I.

-S

2020 Notes: wow, this was interesting to read again, almost a decade later. I stuck largely to the mission statement before the mission outgrew the old site, necessitating a move to this one, and I’m still doing similar stuff today. Sorting through cards, even though the scale I’ve done it at in the years since has occasionally been a little bewildering, ultimately does still fill me with a sense of calm. I’m beginning to move the best stuff from the old site over to the “new” site, almost 4 years after it started, and I hope to go through the entire old site, gradually. I am finally sunsetting the old site after this process is done, and not everything from there will make it over (I want to make it worth your while to read whatever moves here, and some posts were definitely better than others), but I do want to make this archive of my work more complete than it’s been, and offer my insights on the “classic” posts as I go, either at the beginning or the end of each post, depending on what feels appropriate. Wish me luck!